The Afterlife Chronicles Bonus Material: Deleted Part

What's up guys and gals? I figured for the benefit of those who have read my book, The Afterlife Chronicles: Symbol of the Dead, might be interested in some bonus material. Think of it as something you'd find on a Blu-Ray.

The Scene in Question: This would've been the original opener for Chapter 15 - Abducted.

Why it is was deleted: My editor and I felt that the chapter held no significance whatsoever in the story. More filler than anything, which is something you don't want. Although I think the part is somewhat fun, it didn't serve a purpose, so it was deleted from the final draft.

Keep in mind that this hasn't really been edited yet, so you will find mistakes. I've never claimed to be a grammar-wiz or anything of the sort. But I tried to my best to give it a look around, so it wouldn't be THAT bad (I hope.) That's why I hired an editor!

Enjoy!

---

Chapter 15

Abducted    

         Rigor  looks out the window, first to the people on the sidewalk, and then up. Something catches his attention, seeing the shadow of a pretty lady through a the window. She has a nice body and big breasts, which is good enough for Rigor.
"Stop!"
Sam notices the urgency in his voice. "Why?"
"Because. I have found what I've always been looking for."
Sam stops the car and Rigor gets out. He looks up at the woman pretty lady and watches as she takes off is taking off her bra. He smacks his palms together and rubs them with glee anxiously.
"Oh yeah!"
"Oh, no." Sam says, realizing this could spell trouble.
She opens the window, “Rigor!”
“What?”
“Get back in here!”
“Oh, come on, it will only take a second. It usually does before I get smacked and serve some jail time. It’s so worth it though.” Rigor smirks, while winking at Sam, and turns around, heading towards the building.
Sam shakes her head and says to herself, “Why couldn't I just pick Jack? But no Sam, you had to pick the freaking crazy one!”
Rigor puts his fingers into his eye, twists it, and it comes out.  He tosses it into the air and it lands on the windowsill of the lady's apartment. It squeezes under the small gap of the barely open window and intrudes inside.
        The shadow outside didn't lie. She is quite the beauty. The lady walks into the bathroom and Rigor waits anxiously, almost irritated that she went away before he could see her goods. Little does she know that there is a pervert's eye in her house.
"Come to papa."
The eye rolls off the windowsill and moves towards the bathroom. However, a vacuum is heard and the eye twitches in fear. It tries to roll away, but the vacuum’s suction is too strong, and his eye is sucked into the vacuum.
"Frickin’- a! Oh, well." He slaps his arms against his sides. "At least it wasn't eaten by a dog like last time."
What Rigor doesn't know is that three teenagers are behind him and they saw the whole thing. They are gawking at him as if he is their idol.
        The first teen is dressed in gangsta attire, the middle is dressed in prep clothes, and the third is dressed in punk rocker attire with spiked green hair.
The punk says excitedly, "Dude, that was awesome!"
"Yo, man. You gotta teach us how to do that, bro." says the wannabe gangsta.
Rigor quirks his eyebrow and asks, "Care to put that in human terms?"
The one wearing the prep clothes sounds desperate when he pleads to Rigor, "Teach us."
Sam has parked her car and walks down to them, stepping in between them.
"Rigor, let's get going," Sam says.
The wanksta smiles, nodding to his friends in a 'watch this' suave. "Hey mama, you got some pretty legs."
Sam says ironically, "Thanks. I'm flattered. Really,"although she’s not.
"Yeah, honey."
         The punk puts put's his arm around Sam's shoulder and Rigor's lone eye twitches a little with anger.
        "Teach us how you keep those legs in good shape."
"Hey guys," Rigor says. "Let me show you something about respecting the ladies."
Sam puts put's her hand over onto Rigor's mouth to shut him up. She whispers, "Hold on. I got this."
         She turns her attention to the punk. "You want to learn?"
The punk smiles, but not for long, because she knees him in the gut. The punk is winded and runs away with the prep in tow. The gangsta looks like he's going to come at her, but has a change of heart.
"We're sorry!" he yells, running after his buddies.
  Soon after, Rigor gets into the car, laughing. He snaps his fingers and an eye appears in the empty socket.
"That was fun," Sam says sarcastically..
"You’re telling me. So how do you keep those legs in good shape?"
“My father made me take defense classes before I moved here.”
“Good decision.”
"I think we should get back to my place though. I think you've proven that I can forgive you."
"No! We’re free! Let’s go wreck something!"
         Sam gives him a stern look.
         Rigor says in a dull tone, "Fine, let's go back to your boring place. I'm sure Jack, that guy in the wheelchair, and Luke are having the time of their lives, unlike us!"

The Making of Symbol of the Dead

Howdy boils and ghouls and welcome to an article actually written by Scared Sheetless himself! Shocking, I know, but I've been very busy with getting off my butt and actually publishing a book. Something not many aspiring authors can say. It could be because of procrastination (something I'm VERY good at) or because of this strange ideology called life. But to actually say that I went out and actually got this book published is commendable. And it was so easy!

...
...
...

Sorry, I had to laugh hysterically for a moment there and then cry for a little bit too. Writing a book can be an easy task if you have everything organized and know exactly what you want. But there is another side to it that not many people look at and that is, you're not even half way there. Sure, you have a good lengthy book, but have you ever thought that you're not the grammar wiz you thought you were? Hell, I can admit that before I met my great editor (more on that later), my grammar was less than par. I knew it had to be professionally edited.

As with life, nothing magically appears for you. If you're a self-publishing author you need to go out and find these resources yourself. Which can be a difficult task if you're like me and have not a freaking clue of what you're doing. Thankfully, being in the newspaper business, doors were already opened and I could use those tools to my advantage. I emailed Gary Scruton, the owner of the Trendy Times, if he knew anyone who could help. He suggested one of the writers of Trendy Times, but for reasons unknown her phone number wasn't working for me. As much as I do respect this lady, I'm glad I couldn't get a hold of her and for good reason. His next suggestion was Nessa Flax.

When I first met Nessa, I didn't know what to expect. To me, a younger, less wise me, editing was *simply* just sending in your manuscript and bingo, they correct you, you pay a small fee, and then you can be published!

No, you idiot! Not you, you, but me you. It wasn't easy peasy, it wasn't simple, it took from February to November just to edit this damn manuscript! Not easy.

Alright, I'll admit, part of the problem was my own lack of knowledge on the program that Nessa uses to make corrections and to collaborate on the project with you. What she uses is track changes on an Office document. It looks like this ...

 

You will see all these tabs on the side, which is Nessa and I talking about changes to the manuscript. This isn't even the worse of Chapter 2, but for those who read the book now, you will notice that Chapter 2 is not where you meet Rigor Mortis, but is now "Opening the Portal," where Luke enters the Afterlife using the Symbol of the Dead. What we did was swap Chapter 3 and Chapter 2, in the end it made more sense. The frustrating old Chapter 2 has become legend in conversation between Nessa and I, as every time we bump into problems we'll always say, "Well, at least it isn't as bad as Chapter 2." For the record, the "NEW" Chapter 2 (now Chapter 3) doesn't even look like this anymore and is a shade of its former self. This was our hardest chapter, but this was just the beginning too. 

As with life, prolonged breaks from editing were unsuspectingly included in the package. Sickness, surgery, deaths, and all sorts of things can happen during this process. While working on this, Nessa became very ill and was out for a month and a few weeks. Most of my year had been halted due to deaths in the family. But it's life, an unfortunate part of life. But once we got back, we put this manuscript through war. 

Our original intention was to be done in time for October 22nd. I really wanted to release this book on the one year anniversary of my grandfather's death. But we were coming up to September and only three quarters of the way there. We simply couldn't. My family was asking me all the time, "Are you done with your book?," "Whens the book going to be done?," "Whys it taking so long?" A lot of those who asked probably had the same idea I had when first started, as said earlier, you just send it and that's it. Nope. Again, it's a lot more than that and I was going to get a good helping of frustration. 

ISBN and copyrights. Grr. Talk about these two with me about a month or so ago and I'd probably snap and bite your arm off! Okay, I wouldn't. I'm not a cannibal. But it was very demoralizing dealing with these two. ISBN's for one was easy once I did it, now it's going to be second nature. I got my ISBN from this site (click here) and now it's easy. The reason why it was hard was because I didn't even have the resources to Google it. Yes, every bit of my intellect comes from Google (just kidding ... kind of.) I had so many questions, like, "Do I need a separate ISBN for every tablet?" Quick answer: No. More elaborate answer: The reason for this is really only big publishing companies have separate ISBN's for different tablets. That's all I was told and that's what I'm sticking with. The less hassle, the happier I am. 

Copyrights: Technically you're covered as soon as your book is in print. The only reason why you want to copyright your book by law is due to damages cost. Say someone rips off your story and tries to pose it as their own, now you're covered. You're covered anyways if that happens, but this makes it more ... legit, I guess. Copyrights are still Chinese to me, but I'm pretty sure I will copyright my novels in the future. 

Daen Tyler was a big help during this whole process of getting to know your friendly ISBN's and copyrights. Though, she made a suggestion that it's good idea, for any author, to register their own domain name. Like me, go on to http://www.jamesparadie.com, you will see it brings you back here. What this does ... I still don't understand! But apparently it's good for you and you should do it. So there! 

Cover design is a big thing. At first I wasn't too crazy about having one, but the old saying, "Don't judge a book by its cover," is a crock of crap apparently. Those who own tablets tend to buy an unknown author's book based on its cover. Okie-dokie, where to find a cover designer? You can actually find cover designers for cheap, or relatively at least depending on your budget. The one I chose was Elder Lemon Art. I discovered after a fellow author friend of mine, Chad Stambaugh, used them for previous books of his (The Paranormal Dictionary is on sale right now! Cheap plug, Chad!) 

And here's the cover design that is being used now. Looks great and hopefully it pulls in some potential readers. Nessa, myself, and just about all my friends on both my Facebook accounts (yes, I have two. One for myself, one for my paranormal ventures) were having a big debate on the blood spot in the middle. Some said it was too much, some said it wasn't enough, and other said it was just fine. The reason why the blood was such a big deal is because there isn't that much bloodshed in this book. Yes, a character does have to bleed onto to symbol to make the portal open, but it only needs a few drops. I decided to keep it in due to most people said they really liked it with it and thought it wouldn't look good without it. You got to keep your potential readers happy. Readers + happy = fans. Maybe, my math is off. But your fans are important, no matter what. There is no a thing in Hollywood or the world of authors that pisses me off more than those who disrespect their fans. They're not plebeians, they're the one who are paying for your nice mansion and your sports cars and your vacations. Not sure why I went there, but oh well. If you're a fan of Scared Sheetless, you should know I go in all directions at once sometimes. I am a walking oxymoron!

Anyways, they book was finally done editing in mid-November. After that came that hardcopy read where I had to print out two copies of the book. I had to give one to Nessa and the other I kept. Here's why she did a hardcopy: it's because it makes finding mistakes easier. Did we? Yeah, actually. That's not be discouraged, look at like putting another wax on your product before it goes to retail. We didn't find an extravagant amount, so that's also good. That means we did a great job. But even after, when your book is out in the market place, don't be disappointed if you or a reader finds more mistakes. It's always going to happen. It can happen to a 'little' guy like me or a big wig like Stephen King.

Marketing

One of the most important things you have to do is market your book. Now, if you are like me, you don't have any clue on how to market or even the first aspect of marketing. Welcome to a whole new realization of being a self-publisher. Not only do you have to learn all the ins and outs of self-publishing, but you have to learn a whole new hobby that you probably never wanted to do in the first place!

I would say that marketing is easy, but that would only to be a nice guy. I'm not going to sugar coat it. Marketing yourself is a pain in the ass and it's even more so when you're a no name author. But there are some saving graces that I've found over the past year.

-Facebook can be annoying as hell, but it's also a great marketing tool. You don't need to spend hundreds of dollars on their little ads, when you can search for book groups that allow free promotions. I'm a part of at least 20 and ever so often I drop a line about my book. Make sure to leave links to wherever it is located (for example: Amazon -leave a link to the page-, iTunes -same thing-, etc.), as well as either a review or a tiny excerpt from the book. It's not guaranteed to skyrocket your sales, but the idea is to get peoples attention.

The great thing about free advertising is people are curious critters. They love to find out anything that's going on. If you post something on your wall that says, "Hey, look at this!" More than likely you're getting to get quite a few people to look at it. They may not press that Like button or share it, but your main mission is not praise, but attention. Although, it wouldn't hurt for you to ask for shares or likes either.

-Cut down your price, even if it's already cheap. My book goes for $3.99 for the digital versions. That's cheap. You can buy two sodas with that (unless they jacked up the prices since the last time I went out. I don't get out that often). But here's the thing, since you're not Stephen King or any other big wig writer, or if you have no writing credentials before hand, you're automatically screwed. Next great American novel? Are you famous? No? F off then! That's how it works. But if you cheapen your digital book to even free, you'll get quite a few takers. As said on the Facebook paragraph, for right now sales don't matter. Attention does. The more attention you get, the more sales will go up.

But then again, there are those really cheap friends or people who say, "I can't wait to read this book, but I don't have the money. Yet, I spend money every freaking day on a coffee that I don't need and ... and ..." Sorry. We've all been there. We all have those friends who SAY they don't have the money, but they really do. In other words, free loaders. Sure. I may seem like I'm being a jerk, but it's the truth. I'm not saying they're bad people because of it, but yet, I'm not saying it don't annoy me either.

In Conclusion (I Really Want to Put this Article to Bed):

But now it's been almost nine months since I've released my first book and I got to say, it's been a coming to age ride. What I mean by that is if you think you're going to automatically going to be able to quit your job and this will be your income, you're wrong. Some authors? Sure. But most ... no.

As of right now I am working on getting the 2nd book of the series edited and hopefully published by the end of this year. After that, it's all up in the air.

Chapter 4 of Symbol of the Dead

SS Note: Hey readers, here's another chapter of my upcoming ebook Symbol of the Dead. I'm thinking of releasing at least five free chapters of the book. Also, when it comes out (I'm aiming for a near-Halloween release), I will have the ebook available free of charge for a full 24 hours. So say, if I release it at 11:24 p.m., it will be available until that awkward time.

I'm thinking with certain chapters, I may have to split them up into parts, rather than posting the whole thing. The other chapters were relatively small, but the upcoming ones are getting pretty big in page numbers.

And please, please, please, comment on what you thought. Even if you didn't like it, I'd still like to know what you liked and didn't like (as long as you're not a troll about it.) I realize that some people are mainly into serious, horror paranormal books, but the Afterlife Chronicles is more of a fantasy/comedy/adventure. It clearly stays true to the nature of Scared Sheetless, so if you enjoy what you see on this site, I'm sure you will enjoy the book. But please take a moment and tell me what you thought, whether its on here or on my Facebook.

For those who haven't read the previous chapters:

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3

-----

Chapter 4

The Relick's

            "You've been kicked out of the Afterlife."

            "If you wish to stay you will have to say 'sorry'."

            "NEVER!" Rigor yells in triumphant as he puts out his arms and a blue burst of energy comes out of his hands, hits a cabinet and destroys it. He looks at it for a second and smirks.

            "I still got it."  

            He then looks and sees the letter that Ole gave him earlier, crumpled up on a table with the words, Eviction on it. He shakes his head.

            "Evicted from the Afterlife? Where are they going to send me? New Jersey? Better get the spray-on tan, I'm looking a little pale." 

            He has a change of heart.

            "Wait, wait, wait. I don't need to follow orders from a bunch of politicians. I'm above the law. I can choose anywhere I want to go. But where can I go? Wait! I got it! I know someone who will take me in." Rigor pauses. “On second thought, nobody will take me in. I’ll just break in." 

            Rigor begins looking through the random papers around his house, then stands up, rapidly raises his arms and everything in the room rises to the ceiling. He looks up, searching, lets out an “ah!” and flies up, grabbing what looks like a yearbook.

            "I had a ton of friends at Poltergeist Academy who'd love to catch up on some old times with their favorite ghost. Hopefully some chicks." He looks through the Ladies Dorm section and skims through the name-captioned headshots. "Nope. Restraining order. She cursed me a few times. Nun. Ectoplasm change ... gross. Damn, no likely ladies."

            He turns to the “High Honors” pages and continues to skim. Among the collection of dorky characters, prominent figures and downright foully snooty ghosts, there is one skeleton. Just one. His name on the golden bar is "Jack Relick."

Rigor smiles, snaps his fingers, and vanishes.

Jack Relick

            In another dimension, far away from the reaches of Earth or The Afterlife, is a land called Hollow Hill. A place where creatures of the darkest corners lurk, but live in peace and harmony. Where vampires and werewolves share a meal rather than trying to bite each other’s necks off. Where zombies and ghosts share cemeteries rather than having territory wars. The picture is quite clear, when you’re here, you are no longer in Kansas, Pittsburgh, or Timbuktu. Or the Afterlife.

            Inside Hollow Hill is where the King of this land lives. Jack Relick. He is a great king; everyone loves him. All women adore him, especially his loving soul mate and his daughter. All the men, young and elder alike, want to be in his presence. More notably, he is also known as a weird king, because he spends a lot of his time in a lab doing strange experiments. Definitely not your run-of-the-mill king.

            Jack holds a lab glass up to his face. And what a face. Before Jack died, he was burned to the stake during the Salem Witch Trials. At the moment he died, some of his skin still remained but where it was burnt off, bone was exposed. He only has one functioning eye and a fake eye is in the other socket. He thinks of himself as a human/skeleton hybrid because of his body features. 

During his spare time being a King to his adoring denizens, Jack is also a well-known scientist. He spends countless hours working on new experiments, new cure methods for his people’s ailments, and on this particular day he is working on making bugs talk. He has always been fascinated by the possibilities of what people could learn from animals and insects if only they could talk. The liquid he is looking at has a green tinge. He adds a blood-red fluid, and the resulting concoction turns entirely clear. He turns to his trusty ghost dog, Seven, who is lying on the floor next to him. 

            "Seven, I am close to making these bugs talk. Just think of what we can learn from them." His speech has a tang of Irish, but even more New England twang.

            One of the ugly bugs screeches as Seven looks up at Jack. In the next sound it makes there is a hint of a possible word.

            "Jack. Oh, Jack. Hey bonehead!" 

            Jack looks down at the bug on the table. He tilts his head back curiously. Sure, weird things do happen in Hollow Hill just like anywhere else and sometimes like nowhere else, but most bugs do not talk. Yet.

            "You can talk?"

            The bug suavely lifts his buggy eyebrows up and down and looks back at Jack.

            "Yeah. Of course I can talk."

            "My experiment worked then!" He puts up his fists in triumph.

            "No, it’s me!"

            Jack lowers his arms, the triumphant look on his slightly skeletal face melting away.

            "Wait a minute. That voice sounds familiar. Rigor? Oh no, I can’t let you in. I got a family now."

            Rigor sheds his bug form, and morphs into an equally tiny human version of himself.

            "Why not!? Is your wife hot? C’mon man, I need a place to crash … err, I mean stay,” he says, not wanting Jack to know he was kicked out of the Afterlife. If Jack knew, he probably wouldn’t let Rigor stay.

            But Jack is not stupid. "Did you get kicked out of the Afterlife … again?” he asks.

Rigor scratches the back of his head.

"Come on. Out with it." Jack says. 

            "Um, I came here for a visit! You know it’s been well over a hundred years since I last saw you."

            "You know, you could of wrote."

            "I'm a righty with two lefties." Rigor tries a lame excuse to explain why he hasn’t written to his best friend.

 Jack rolls his one eye and shakes his head.

"Jack, please. Just for a little while."

            "I would, but the thing is, Hollow Hill denizens hold a lot of things against The Afterlife and its inhabits. You would be viewed as a liability. I can't deal with that right now. We just had a locust invasion. They weren't as troublesome as you are though."

            "Really?" Rigor grins.

            "Figured you'd take that as a compliment. But no, you here? Bad idea.”

            "What do you mean? I’m practically a ghost legend!"

            "Regardless …”

            "A week?…Two weeks?…" Rigor's voice gives away his desperation.

Jack is almost tempted to reconsider, when Rigor goes on.

"… A month?"

            "A month!? You DID get kicked out of the Afterlife."

            "Alright, fine! I did get kicked out and this time they mean it, but it wasn‘t my fault!"

            Jack chuckles. "Yeah, Rigor, I don’t know how many times I’ve heard that before."

            But Rigor is serious. "They want me to say the ‘s’ word, Jack."

            "Shower?" Rigor gives him a stern look. "Because, you know, in the years I’ve known you, you could use one."

            "You know better than that.”

            "Then what?"

            Rigor turns pale and moves closer to Jack, who lowers himself in front of Rigor.

            "They want me to say, so...suururrr..."

            "What? Tell me."

            "They want me to say...sarower."

            "You're not making much sense. Come to think of it, that's pretty much the norm for you."

            "Okay, fine. I'll spell it out. S.A.W.R.E!" He even spells it out with his arms like he's doing "YMCA". 

            Jack lips it out Rigor’s attempt at spelling the word. "Oh, you mean 'sorry!'"

            Rigor snaps his fingers. "Yes!"

            "Just go ahead and tell them then. It's not like you haven’t said it before without really meaning it."

            "Well, those times I was extremely wasted and you know what a poor sap I am when I drink."

            "Yeah, it's pretty pathetic.

            Rigor shoots an angry glare towards Jack, but his expression quickly shifts to pleading.

"Jack...you’re still my best friend."

            "Well…"

            Rigor's eyes then get all big and teary. "Please, Jack."

            "That is not going to work with me." Jack says, but Rigor's eyes get bigger and more teary.

            Jack lets out an aggravated sigh. "Alright, but you need to keep a low profile. AND you …"

            But Rigor hollers an excited "Woo-wooo!" and transforms into his normal height. He jumps down from the table and puts his arm around Jack's shoulder.

            "Thanks pal, if you kept on beating around the bush like that, I'd have to break your skull in."

            "You didn't let me finish: AND you need to obey the rules."

            Rigor looks at Jack smugly.

            "Jack, baby, I'm not a rules type of guy. You know that."

            Yes, yes, Jack does know.

            "Yes, but--and do NOT call me baby--if you are going to stay here then you are going to HAVE TO obey the rules. I've saved this town from a corrupt king and given them a King not many of them want to disembowel." 

            Rigor claps encouragingly. "Good deal. I mean, the whole not-many-people-want-to-disembowel-you sounds pretty boring, but hey, I'm proud of you." Rigor lights up a smoke. "First things first. Where's the ladies at?"

            "What?"

            "Jack!" A pleasant yell rises from downstairs.

            Rigor smiles. "Oh, I hear lady number one. She the royal skull cleaner?" His eyebrows go up and down.

            "She's my soul mate." 

            "Get off of it. That's just a dorky way of saying bed pal."

            "I believe I said, soul mate." 

            Rigor puts his arm around his shoulder. "Is this a happy relationship?" Jack gives him an angry look. "Because, you know, I can take her from you." 

            "Jack! What’s with all the rumbling going on up there?" Jack's soul mate yells again.

            "Be right down in a minute!" Jack calls down to her.

            "So, you going to introduce me to your woman?" Rigor smirks devilishly.

            "Yeah, I suppose I should. I still consider you my best friend. But no, I'm not going to."

            Rigor doesn't look pleased. "What's up with that?"

            "You’ve stolen a few of my girlfriends. I don't want the same thing to happen here." 

            "Not my fault. They loved me for my sexiness! I can’t help being a sexy beast!" He chuckles. "Nah, I’m just messing with you. I couldn’t help it if you weren’t that smooth with the ladies, Jack."

            Jack just shakes his head. "God, I hate you," he turns around and walks down the metal, spiral staircase.

            "Oh, you love me and you know it," Rigor laughs. 

            Jack walks down the steps with Rigor gliding a few short feet behind him. A pretty lady wearing a red and black dress is in the kitchen cleaning, with her back to the stairs. Jack motions for Rigor to stay where he is, behind the opening that leads into the kitchen. He rolls his eyes, and lights another cigarette with a flame flaring from the tip of his thumb. Jack goes to his soul mate and puts both arms on her shoulders.

            "Jack, what was that sound?" the woman says, turning around.

            Rigor sees that despite being dead, she is quite lovely. Decomposition has not touched her skin and her facial expressions are lively.

            "Katrina, you know how you were telling me I should get some new friends?"

            "Yes?" 

            "Well, an old friend from my school days just showed up."

            She smiles, a sweet, gentle smile. "Really?"

            "Yeah!"

            "That’s great! Where is he? I'd love to meet him." 

            "You'll be the only one." Jack laughs nervously. "That's for sure." He turns his head to Rigor's direction. "Rigor."

            "Rigor? That’s kind of a funny name." 

            "Yeah, his last name is Mortis."

            "Hmm, he must be an interesting type."

            Jack mutters, "That’s an understatement." He then calls again. "Rigor! Come in and meet Katrina." 

            Rigor glides through the entryway into the kitchen.

"How’s it…” his voice trails off. His vision fogs. Katrina is all he can see and his brain seems to be on hold.

She is smiling, but Jack watches Rigor suspiciously as Rigor starts to mumble things not even a drunk utter. Jack quirks an angry eyebrow. Katrina’s smiles takes on a nervous edge.

            "Rigor, are you okay?" Jack asks. He snaps his fingers in front of Rigor's face.

            Rigor comes to but still appears to be slightly entranced.

"Wow," is all he can manage.

            Jack smiles, "Yeah, she is wow."

            Katrina wraps her arm around Jack. "Aw, thanks Jack,” she says sweetly.

            Rigor’s mind wakes up and kicks into dirty gear. "You’re a spicy hot, momma! Let me guess? On your first date, ol' Jacky boy here left you in stitches, huh? Ha! Stitches! You get it?" Jack laughs nervously as Katrina's smile fades a little more.

            "It's a pleasure, Rigor," she says coolly.

            "Yep. You know, back in our Poltergeist Academy days, me and Jack used to be quite the pair." Rigor says with a smile, thinking of the old days.

            “That was a long time ago,” she says sternly.

            "Maybe, but you know what people say. Some things never change, right Jack? Me and Jack always had one rule." Rigor says, holding up his index finger. 

            "Oh, really?" Katrina responds in a frosty tone of voice.

            Jack is getting a little nervous as he butts in. "Uh, Kat, don't you have to go to the Witches’ Shop or something? I think I got to go and take Rigor out back and show him my VERY SHARP guillotine."

            "No, Jack, she wants to hear the rule. Don't you?" Rigor says to Katrina. 

            “I suppose so,” she says politely.

            Rigor puts his hand on Katrina's shoulder. "The one rule is, Jack lets me mingle with his ladies. It's kind of like an open house. So, with that being said, want to go do the monster mash?"

            "Oh, god." Jack smacks his head as Rigor smirks in his annoying fashion.

            Katrina’s polite smile disappears, anger flares in her eyes. Without telegraphing her intention, she punches him in the face and stomps out of the room.

 This chick knows how to throw a punch, Rigor thinks, realizing his nose is squashed into his head. He likes that about her, of course. He smacks the back of his head with his hand and his face goes back to normal. He smirks at Jack, who clearly does not share Rigor’s feeling.

            "You haven't lost your way with woman, I see."

            "Were you really that surprised?"

            "Not really."

            "Jack." Katrina calls to him from the door. "I am going to the Witches’ Store to buy some supplies. I will be back in a few hours...he better NOT be here when I return!"

            She slams the steel door behind her with strength that not many woman, dead or alive, have. Jack jumps from the door’s crashing. He looks at Rigor angrily, but Rigor’s smirk is unchanged.

            "Buddy!" 

            "'Buddy!'" Jack mocks him. "You've been here for a half an hour and already you're causing more ruckus than the Headless Horseman!"

            "I'll be a good little boy, Jack. I’ll be better. But for now, how about a grand tour of this place?"

            Jack doesn't like the idea, so he tries to stammer out of it. "I don’t know. I mean, I’m sure they’ll die to see a legend of the ghost world, but these ghouls are different here than they are in the Afterlife."

“How so?” Rigor asks.

"These ghouls are not accustomed to…" Jack flails for an answer as Rigor looks at him with a “go on” expression. "A ghost of your type." 

            But Rigor is persistent. "C’mon, Jack. What’s the worst that can happen?"

            "With you? Anything!" Jack says, knowing from experience. 

            "Hey! I'm offended by that. Look a tear." Rigor says, pointing to his eye. 

            "You're dead, you can't cry." 

            "I can dry cry!" 

            Jack has had enough. Just give him his own way, he'll be fine. Jack says to himself. "Fine, if I show you around. Will you at least try not to destroy this place?"

            "No promises." Rigor says jauntily. 

            Jack sighs. "With you that's good enough."